“Now I was on the poise whether to tell the truth or not; but I was rather constrained to lie; but the captain says, ‘tell me the truth, Peter, for ’twill be better for you in the end; so I up and told him my whole story, as straight as a compass, and long as a string.
“‘Well’ says he, ‘be a good boy, and I’ll take care on you.’ So we stayed in New York a few days, and back to Albany, and started for New York agin and we had fourteen pretty genteel passengers, and the captain says, ‘now Peter be very attentive to ’em and you’ll git a good many presents from ’em.’ ‘So I cleaned their boots and waited on ’em, and when I got to York I carried their baggage round the city, and when I got to the sloop I counted my money, and had six dollars fifty cents, jist for bein’ polite, and it’s jist as easy to be polite as any way.
“Well, the next mornin’ the captain comes to me about daylight, and hollers, ‘up nig, there’s a present for you on deck.’
“So I hops up in great haste and there was stuck on the sign of the vessel, an advertisement, and ‘reward of one hundred dollars, and all charges paid for catchin’ a large bull-eyed Negro, &c.’ The captain reads that to me, and says very seriously, ‘Peter that’s a great reward. You run down in the cabin and git your breakfast, I must have that hundred dollars; for one hundred dollars don’t grow on every bush.’
“Well, I started and went down, a sobbin’ and cryin’ to get breakfast, and calls the captain down to eat, and he sets down and says he, ‘Peter ain’t you agoin’ to set down and eat somethin’? it will be the last breakfast you’ll eat with us.’
“I says with a very heavy heart, ‘no Sir, I wants no breakfast.’ Arter breakfast says he, ‘now clear off the table, and do up all your things nice and scour your brasses, so that when I get another cook he shan’t say you was a dirty feller.’ So I goes and obeys all his orders, and I shed some tears tu, I tell ye; and then I set down and had a regular-built cryin’ spell, and then the captain comes down and says, ‘you done all your work up nicely?’ ‘Yis Sir,’ ‘well, now go and tie up all your clothes.’ So I did, and I cried louder than ever about it, and he says, ‘I guess you han’t got ’em all have ye?’ So he unties my bundle, and takes all on ’em out one by one, and lays ’em in the berth, and I cried so you could hear me to the forecastle; and finally he turns to me a pleasant look and says, ‘Peter put up your clothes; I’ve no idea of takin’ you back, I’ve done this only to try you; and now I tell you on the honor of a man, as long as you stay with me, and be as faithful as you have been, nobody shall take you away from me alive; and then I cries ten times worse than ever, I loved the captain so hard. But a mountain rolled off on me, for I tell you to be took right away in the bloom of liberty, arter I’d toiled so hard to git it, and then have all my hopes crushed in a minute, I tell you for awhile I had mor’n I could waller under. But when I got acquain’ted with the captain, I found him a rale abolitionist, for he’d fight for a black man any time, and ☞ Oh! how he did hate slavery: ☜ but then he kind’a loved to run on a body, and then make ’em feel good agin, and he was always a cuttin’ up some sich caper as this; but he was a noble man and I love him yit.
“Now I felt that I was raly free ☜ although I knew Morehouse was a lurkin’ round arter me: and arter this I called no man master, but I knew how to treat my betters. I now begun to ☞ feel somethin’ like a man, ☜ and the dignity of a human bein’ begun to creep over me, and I enjoyed my liberty when I got it, I can tell you. I didn’t go a sneakin’ round, and spirit-broken, as I know every man must, if he’s a slave; but ☞ I couldn’t help standin’ up straight, arter I knew I was free. ☜ Oh! what a glorious feelin’ that is! and oh! how I pitied my poor brethren and sisters, that was in chains. I used to set down and think about it, and cry by the hour; and when I git to thinkin’ about it now, I wonder how any good folks, and specially christian people, can hate abolitionists. ☜ I think it must be owin’ to one of two things; either they don’t know the horrors or miseries of a slave’s life, or they can’t have much feelin’; for the anti-slavery society is the only society I know on, that professes to try to set ’em all free; for you know the colonization folks have give up the idee long ago, that they can do any thing of any amount that way; and so they say they are agoin’ to enlighten Africa. And I can’t for the life on me see how the abolitionists is so persecuted; it’s raly wonderful! ☜ But I’m glad I can pray to God for the poor and oppressed, if I am a black man; and I think it can’t be a long time afore all the slaves go free—there is so many thousands of christians all prayin’ for it so arnestly; and so many papers printed for the slave, and so many sarmints preached for him, and sich a great struggle agoin’ on for him all over creation. Why all this is God’s movin’s, and nobody can’t stop God’s chariot wheels.” ☜
A. “Well, Peter, you’ve come to a stopping place now, and I think we’ll close this book, for I suppose you’ll have some sea stories to tell.”
P. “Yis, Domine. I shall have some long yarns to reel off when I gets my sails spread out on the brine, for I think the rest of my history is no touch to my sailor’s life. But one thing, it won’t be so sorrowful, if ’tis strange; for, if I was rocked on the wave, I had this sweet thought to cheer me, as I lay down on my hammock, ☞ I’m free; ☜ and dreams of liberty hung round my midnight pillow, and I was happy, because I was no longer Peter Wheeler in chains.”